


Timeless Ends

by Khat



Category: Supernatural
Genre: 5 a.m. inspiration?, Castiel's healing touch, Gen, Platonic Relationships, Unexpected Side Effects, no idea how to tag this honestly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-16
Updated: 2020-03-16
Packaged: 2021-03-01 05:27:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 952
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23170048
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Khat/pseuds/Khat
Summary: Castiel can heal more than just broken bones and pulled muscles.  And the bible didn't get 'everything' wrong.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 19





	Timeless Ends

**Author's Note:**

> So yeah, yet again I should be working on other things. Fear not, they are not forgotten. In the meantime though, this popped into my head, thanks to my recent Supernatural obsession (must stop falling in love with shows when they are almost over/already ended) and I had to write it down. I haven't seen anyone take quite this approach yet, though that kind of surprises me, because it seems like it would be an obvious thing. Maybe it's just that Cas spends so much time powered down.

They don’t notice it at first. Dean grumbles about how he’s getting too old for this shit when he gets thrown across the room by a vampire, but he get back up and ganks the bastard, and Castiel’s there afterwards, to heal the huge bruise across his back. 

Sam breaks his leg on a hunt tripping into a badgerhole, of all things, and Castiel has him walking again in a few minutes.

It’s just normal by now.

It’s an old Hunter friend they haven’t seen in over a decade who says it, sitting at a bar with Dean, just a few weeks shy of his 50th birthday.

“Man, I don’t know how you manage it. You don’t look any older than you did the last time I saw you.”

“Good food, good beer, and lots of exercise.” Dean jokes. He remembers, though, stopping that night to study himself in the mirror. And, of course, he can’t judge the best, but he does think he looks young for his age, now. There are fewer wrinkles than there should be, and not a single grey in his dark blond hair.

“Hey, Sammy,” he calls, poking his head into his brother’s room. “How old would you think I was? If you didn’t know?” Sam gives him a confused look, but apparently decides to humour him.

“Early 40s, maybe 45. Why?”

“Just something Frank said.” Dean answered, shrugging it off, forgetting about it when Sam mentioned a rumour about a banshee.

******

Sam was the one to bring it up the next time, accidentally.

“That stuff’s going to kill you one of these days.” He commented, frowning at the bacon cheeseburger Dean was munching on.

“I’m 57 years old, Sammy, and I look as good as ever, so it can’t be doing that much damage.” The younger Winchester suddenly froze, a forkful of his own baked zucchini halfway to his mouth.

“You’re right.” He commented. Dean nearly choked.

“The world must be ending again.”

“You DO look as good as ever, though.” And that earned Sam a weirded-out look. He ignored it, though. “So do I. Hunters at our age, if they haven’t died, should at least be semi-retired. We should be taking pain pills just to get out of bed. You’re nearly 60, Dean, and you could pass for at least 10 years younger.”

Dean just shrugged. “Good genes.” He decided. “And we’ve got Cas healing us when we get hurt bad, so they don’t have time to cause trouble.”

“I suppose.”

******

Sam turns 60.

Dean reaches 70.

By the time both have passed 80, they know something is strange. They are both still as fit and unlined as men half their ages.

It’s not until Dean’s watching Castiel fix Sam’s busted shoulder that he puts it together, though, and then he wonders why he didn’t sooner.

“Cas, are you healing our old age?” The angel pauses, and there’s a not quite furtiveness about him.

“Not exactly.” He answers. Sam blinks at them, and Dean can see the moment he realises it as well.

“You are.” He accuses, and Castiel’s expression goes carefully blank. “You’re keeping us young.”

“I am not stopping you from aging.” He hedges, then sighs, coming clean. “I’m simply healing the injuries that would come with time and cause damage, and reversing certain effects. The loss of skin elasticity that causes wrinkles, the lack of colouring agents that produces grey hair. Dean’s liver cirrhosis,” this prompts a knowing look toward the older brother by the younger, “Sam’s brain tumour…”

“Wait, what?”

“Brain tu-Sammy had cancer?”

“Certain muscle breakdowns, general things like that,” the angel finished, then added, “it was only a small tumour and may have been benign. It’s gone now, in any case.”

“You’re a goddamn Fountain of Youth?” Dean exclaimed. “Why didn’t you just tell us?” Castiel frowned at the blasphemy, but it was an automatic reaction, and he simply shrugged after.

“I didn’t realise I was doing it at first, and then it didn’t seem important. I like the way you both look _now_.”

“So,” Sam mused, “if we don’t get killed on the job or something, how long will we live.”

“Your bible is not entirely wrong. Many of the men named in it had their own guardian angels.” The two brothers exchanged looks, taking that in.

“Cas,” Sam said slowly, “some of the men in there lived to be over half a century old.” Cas simply tilted his head questioningly.

“Did they become unhealable?” Dean added, “or did their angels just stop healing them.”

“Their work was complete.” The small brunet answered cryptically. But the statement was plenty clear anyway.

“So assuming you don’t lose your power, and we don’t die unavoidably, we could live forever? Son of a bitch.”

“Forever is a very-”

“Cas…” Sam seemed uninterested in any more wordplay.

“Theoretically.” The angel answered reluctantly. Dean swore again.

******

There are stories, spread amongst Hunters, told as warnings from older monsters to the younger, written in books that most consider fantasy. Stories about the immortal Brothers Winchester, and their tame blue-eyed demon, Castiel, who keeps them young. The brothers have been around since time began, most claim, protecting the innocent and destroying those who would prey on them. Some say they even killed God to save the world. Nobody knows exactly what they look like, but there are descriptions, pretty, long-haired Sam, brash, mercenary Dean, and Castiel the Unholy Accountant. Some Hunters claim to have met them, though few believe them. Some even pray to them for strength and luck.

Whatever the stories, there is one thing all know. When the Winchesters finally do cease to exist, the world and all within it will end. 

**Author's Note:**

> Admittedly, this is, of course, all my own headcanon, but there is a sort of precedence. If you look in the bible, (the specific bit I found was Genesis 11:10 on,) they list how long the men named in it lived. Shem is the oldest listed there and it states that he lived to be 600 years old. It's been a long time since I got into that, (I don't really believe the bible is anything more than fiction with some nice 'moral of the story's,) but I know there were plenty of other long-lived people, too.  
> Given that God, and thus his angels, were still active then, it is a very real possibility that in the Supernatural world, they might have been supported by Guardian Angels like Cas, and then were simply left to die when they were no longer useful, because, hey, as Dean would say, God is a dick.


End file.
